1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to devices and methods of analyzing, and to devices and methods of categorizing data.
2. Discussion of Related Art
In the prior art, there are devices and methods that categorize and analyze text data. One example is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,006,221 (the xe2x80x9c""221 Patentxe2x80x9d). The ""221 Patent discloses a document retrieval system where a user can enter a query and retrieve documents from a database. Each document in the database is subjected to a set of processing steps to generate a language-independent conceptual representation of the subject content of the document. A query is also subjected to a set of processing steps to generate a language-independent conceptual representation of the subject content of the query. The documents and queries can also be subjected to additional analysis to provide additional term-based representations, such as the extraction of information-rich terms and phrases. Documents are matched to queries based on the conceptual-level contents of the document and query, and optionally, on the basis of the term-based representation. The query""s representation is then compared to each document""s representation to generate a measure of relevance of the document to the query.
The prior art systems sometimes suffer from an inability to properly identify some relevant documents. The prior art systems sometimes suffer from an inability to properly measure the document""s relevance to the query.
The invention described and claimed herein represents an improvement over prior art systems in that in many situations, the invention is better able to properly identify relevant documents, and is better able to properly measure the document""s relevance to the query. Moreover, the invention provides a unified architecture to integrate multiple media and heterogeneous databases so that they can be analyzed and traversed with a single query. The invention structures data to permit complex analytic operations and to equip automated agents to perform these operations in interaction with signals provided by a user, a changing data environment, or other automated agents. The invention also is able to preserve semiotic information not captured by prior art systems.
The invention includes a system that has a searchable database. The database has pieces of media. At least some of the pieces of media have associated therewith a describer. For example, a describer may indicate a relationship between portions of the piece of media, or a describer may indicate how the portion is used, interpreted or its effect.
The invention also includes a computer readable medium having pieces of media thereon. At least one of the pieces of media has a portion identified by a describer. The describer indicates a semiotic property of the portion.
The invention also includes a method wherein a database of pieces of media is provided with describers corresponding to portions of a piece of media. A query having semiotic signifiers is provided. The query is used to search for and retrieve possibly relevant media corresponding to the query.